Various systems and methods exist to provide radiation therapy treatment of tumorous tissue with high-energy radiation. While some patient conditions require whole body radiation treatments, many forms of radiation treatment benefit from the ability to accurately control the amount, location and distribution of radiation within a patient's body. Such control often includes applying various levels of radiation to various areas of the tumorous region. For example, in some instances it is desirable to apply a greater dosage of radiation to one portion of a tumorous region than another. As another example, in some instances it is desirable to minimize the dosage of radiation to non tumorous regions where radiation may have deleterious effects. Due to a variety of contributing factors, achieving accurate control of the amount, location and distribution of radiation within the patient's body can be difficult. Among these factors are movement in the patient's body, changes in organ or inter organ structure or composition, and changes in the relative position of a patient's organs.
Prior to a radiation therapy, the patient undergoes an imaging procedure to determine the exact size, shape and location of the tumorous region. In a radiation treatment session, the patient is subjected to radiation from an accelerator that emits a beam of radiation energy collimated and oriented to enter the patient's body from a particular angle. Varying the intensity and the entry angle of the incident radiation beam allows a radiation specialist to generate a radiation dose volume that corresponds to the size, shape, and location of the tumorous region.
Several factors may prevent optimal radiation exposure to the tumorous region and minimal radiation exposure of the healthy tissue regions. For example, minor changes in patient's position from the imaging device to the treatment device may radically alter the position of the tumorous region or organ. In existing procedures, the patient is generally placed on a first patient support when the imaging device is used to obtain images of the patient. After the imaging session, the patient is then moved to a second patient support where the patient can be treated in a treatment session. As a result of moving the patient to different supports, the position and/or the shape of the target tissue within the patient may change.
Sometimes, a treatment radiation device and a diagnostic device may be placed in a same room to thereby reduce a transportation distance between the treatment and diagnostic devices. In such systems, the treatment radiation device may remain on while the diagnostic device is used to image the patient. If the treatment radiation device is placed too closely to the diagnostic device, a magnetic field (resulted from maintaining the accelerator of the treatment radiation device on) may interfere with an operation of the diagnostic device. Sometimes, the diagnostic device may remain on while the treatment device is used to treat the patient. In the case in which the diagnostic device includes a particle accelerator (e.g., an electron accelerator, as in an x-ray source), a magnetic field (resulted from maintaining the accelerator of the diagnostic device on) may also interfere with the operation of the treatment device.
Another problem associated with existing radiation system that includes a rotating radiation source is that a patient may feel uncomfortable while a radiation source is rotating around the patient. In the case in which the radiation source is secured to an arm that rotates around the patient, the patient may also be injured by a rotating arm if accidentally comes in contact with it. As such, it may be desirable to protect the patient from a rotating component of a radiation system while the patient is undergoing through treatment and/or imaging.
A further problem associated with existing radiation systems is that they are bulky and occupy much space. This is attributable at least in part by the fact that existing radiation systems use an electromagnetic system to change a trajectory of a beam. Such electromagnetic system generally takes up a lot of space and is expensive to make. As such, it would be desirable to provide a radiation system that is space efficient and/or less expensive to manufacture.